


(you will always know)

by configurations



Category: Fall Out Boy
Genre: Light Angst, M/M, Pining, a through-the-years fic, non-verbal intimacy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-18
Updated: 2017-07-18
Packaged: 2018-12-03 18:15:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11537775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/configurations/pseuds/configurations
Summary: Pete is sayinghey Patrickas he leans in just a fraction of an inch closer.Patrick is sayingheyas his eyes flutter shut.They don’t talk about it.Or: Pete and Patrick through the years.





	(you will always know)

**Author's Note:**

> "This song in particular is about when you first open the door, and you see that stranger, and maybe it’s their eyes or maybe it’s their voice, but you know that you will follow them all the way across the world, anywhere they go, for their head, and for their heart.”
> 
> -pete introducing headfirst slide  
> [x](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wF3olRgXnzM)

They don’t talk about it.

It’s somewhere during the tail end of 2004 and they’re cramped in the back of the van on their way to somewhere in Conneticut. Andy’s driving while Joe rides shotgun, slumped against the window. They are arguing about what to play on the radio, as they always do when Joe rides shotgun with Andy at the helm, the soundtrack changing every 5 seconds or so. Pete and Patrick are at the back.

And they don’t talk about it.

Pete gazes out of the window into the frozen tundra, ice and snow blanketing fields and forests in the distance while Patrick pretends to be asleep next to him, his breathing too even and his posture too stiff.

They don’t talk how Pete’s been hanging off Patrick during shows for longer periods of times, how his breath dances on Patrick’s neck like hot coal. They don’t talk about trailing hands or lingered gazes. They don’t talk about how Pete leans in towards Patrick more often than not when they’re in the van like right now, or how Patrick leans back in too, his head in the crook of Pete’s neck like the final piece of a jigsaw puzzle. It’s one of those unspoken Pete And Patrick things that they’ll realise later on when they are _Pete And Patrick._

  
Pete is saying _hey Patrick_ as he leans in just a fraction of an inch closer.   
Patrick is saying _hey_ as his eyes flutter shut.

They don’t talk about it.

 

  
It’s 2006, and Pete just got dumped.

It doesn’t matter. He’ll get over it. It’s a good way to clear the words from his head, anyway.

He’s sitting at the table in his bus, Hemingway drooling away at his foot. He sits there idly, staring at the leather bound and beaten to hell notebook sprawled out in front of him, the blank, white pages taunting him. He twirls his pen in his hand once, twice. Taps it against the wooden table. He contemplates ordering pizza so he can pity eat. Somewhere in the middle of his contemplation, Patrick politely knocks on the open bus door gently before walking in, guitar strapped to his back, two bags of In-and-Out in tow. He closes the bus door behind him and suddenly it is stiflingly quiet, the silence all encompassing and crushing, save for Hemmy’s soft snuffles and grunts. Patrick sits down from across Pete and sets the bags of In-and-Out down before breaking the silence with his guitar.

They don’t talk about it.

Pete stares at Patrick plucking away at an easy, familiar tune for a moment before grabbing a greasy burger from the bag. Patrick then plucks a tune that sounds so earnest and full of yearning that Pete shoves the burger into his mouth and hastily scribbles out a lyric in his notebook.

He writes, _trade baby blues for wide eye browns_. Patrick continues plucking at his guitar. Their eyes meet. Patrick looks tired, too.

Pete doesn’t say, _thank you._  
Patrick doesn’t say, _don’t worry about it._

They don’t talk about it.

 

  
It’s somewhere in June of 2009, or April or July, Pete can't seem to remember off the top of his head. The months have begun fading together in a blur of tour dates and cramped airplane seats.

And they’re touring and touring and touring.

Pete and Patrick arent Pete and Patrick anymore, they haven’t been for a long time, Pete not seeing Patrick on most days until it’s show time, which is an impressive feat considering the fact that they’re on a constant tour cycle. Pete yearns and yearns and wants and wants.

But they don’t talk about it.

They don’t talk about they way Pete rests his head on Patrick’s shoulders longer than he should be during a show, they don’t talk about the way Patrick’s gaze feels tired and heavy. They don’t talk about how Pete’s been getting more antsy and fidgety, reminiscent of the way he was in ‘05, or the way Patrick seems to be snapping at everyone and everything more so than usual. They don’t talk about shorter tempers or lingered touches or hushed whispers or eye bags that look like they’re bruises. They don’t talk about it, and Pete wishes they had.

He leans in towards Patrick at a show for the seventh, the fiftieth, the hundredth time, and closes his eyes.

His bassline sounds a lot more like _I’m sorry._

Patrick looks at him from corner of his eye, beads of sweat dripping down his face. He belts out the next note, long and sorrowful.

It sounds a lot like _me too._

 

And so, they don’t talk about it.

They go on hiatus. It’s fine, it’s alright. But they don’t talk about Pete’s divorce or Patrick’s breakup or anything. Pete feels the once-shared language he had with Patrick taper off, the man becoming a closed book. Once upon a time, a long time ago, Pete could’ve probably written the book on Patrick– but he’s left feeling that he doesnt even know the man’s favourite colour more often than not now. Days rolled by, then weeks, months and then years of not talking about it.

And it’s 2013, and people have come and gone and friends have been made and have left and children have been born and they still don’t talk about it.

They don’t exactly become Pete and Patrick again, unfortunately. (Or fortunately enough.) Pete and Patrick was them of the past and now Patrick has grown, his stance taller and that much more confident and Pete has mellowed out and is quieter and more observant than he used to be, and Pete thinks that it’ll be fine. They’ll work it out somehow.

They always do, anyway.

Pete doesn't hang off Patrick anymore, pulls away too quickly when Patrick leans in, doesn't whisper hushed nothings into his neck anymore. Casual touches between them are few and far between for the first year of the band’s return, the both of them still finding their footing again, and it’s fine, really. They’ve all grown and changed but– 

Pete and Patrick still don’t talk about it. They write whole songs without so much as glancing at the other, have full conversations without words. Pete thinks that maybe they never had to talk about it.

Pete thinks, _soulmates, soulmates, soulmates. We're soulmates._

From the corner of the studio, Joe says, _can you both stop doing that, it’s fucking creepy oh my god–_

Pete ignores Joe and pulls out his phone instead. He opens his notes app and quickly types, _you are my favourite what if my best i’ll never know_ before the words can escape him. His hands are shaky when he presses “done” on the screen.

 

It'a 2015, and the bus is bumpier than usual. Cars and trucks and motorcycles groan on outside, lamp posts lining the street like fireflies. And–

Patrick walks towards Pete from where he had previously been camping out in his bunk. Pete’s on the couch, a random episode of game of thrones of the television. It's another one of those nights that seem to escape him. Pete’s just grateful that they dont have a show tomorrow. Pete looks up at Patrick with tired eyes, surprised. Patrick settles next to him on the small couch, pulling his legs up and angling them towards pete just so so their knees touch. And they don’t talk about–

“Hey,” Patrick says. Patrick looks at him from the corner of his eye, hair tousled and glasses askew, his face illuminated by the blue hues of the TV and the warmth of the street lights flashing by them. Pete blinks, once, twice, before relaxing into the couch, shifting so that his entire leg is pressed up against Patrick’s. Patrick curls in towards Pete in return. 

“Hey,” he replies, and they both focus their attention back to Khaleesi on the screen. 

Surely enough though, Patrick can’t focus on the episode and he very soon begins drumming a beat with his fingers on Pete’s thigh.

_Tap-tap tap-tap tap._

_Tap tap tap taptap tap._

_Tap tap-tap tap._

Without even looking away from the screen, Pete brings up a clammy hand and puts it over Patrick’s restless ones. He curls his fingers over Patrick’s palm and very gently pushes it flat against Pete’s thigh. Patrick stops, and Pete feels the tension leave his body.

They don’t talk about it.

Patrick gives him the tiniest of smiles, a tired but unmistakably fond one, a smile that Pete has seen in the darkness of a moving van, in dim lighting in shitty motels, at the back of big, grand stages, at diners and carparks and award shows and hotel rooms.

Pete smiles back, sighing with it, and they watch the rest of the episode in silence, until Patrick dozes off with Pete following suit soon after, plunging into a dreamless, peaceful sleep.

Before he does, however, he lets himself indulge, lets himself wonder–

_Do you know?_

_Do you feel the same way?_

_Do you–_

 

_Do you know?_

 

Pete thinks that Patrick _has_ to know– he _has_ to know. Of _course_ he does. How could– how could he _not_ know, after all this time?

His mind races at a million miles a minute before Patrick hears him, hears his voice over the noise and static and clammy hands and restless legs. Patrick hears him through the frantic whispers and stage antics and convoluted lyrics that always seem to center around a particular subject matter. Patrick hears him. He moves his hand out from under Pete’s and places it atop Pete’s hand in a similar gesture as Pete did before.

“Sleep,” Patrick whispers, and Pete follows that voice, follows it from stages to bumpy vans and hotel rooms, follows that voice to the ends of the Earth.

He sleeps.

**Author's Note:**

> started this on a cold 3 am night in 2015 and promptly forgot about it until last week. hope you like it! i've missed these boys. as always, kudos and comments are always appreciated! thank you for reading! :)


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